Chapter 46: The StingSmoky and burning, like a caustic needle imbedding itself, the stings penetrated not only flesh, but probed carefully hidden mind space where sleeping memories were disturbed and threaded on painful strands of the past.
A barn, lifeless machinery, distant sounds of tractors, sizzling heat, smells of hay, dirt…and dog. A puppy, golden, and playfully frolicking, nipping at anything, snapping at dust particles…
The sting went deeper.
Love spread faster than wasp venom. Forgotten behind time; the love between a boy and his first dog all but eclipsed by work, adulthood, fatherhood and guilt.
I’d named him Ernie after my favorite uncle.
The dog, the boy, the hot white sun, I didn’t listen…I should have listened…
There had been wasps.
* * * *
It had been a particularl
